Punishment vs. Reality

Punishment vs. Reality

I am often taken aback by certain dichotomies. So many – at least those who are the most vocal – seem to plant their feet quite firmly on either the right or left side on most issues and fail to see much of the gray in the middle. 

This is certainly true with very serious decisions. For example, most who speak about their political views do so in no uncertain terms. They clearly lean either left or right. Similarly, those who speak about very specific issues – such as abortion, the death penalty, or gay marriage – are absolute in their views and convictions. They are unwavering and immovable.

And for some issues, this tendency makes sense. Whether viewed through religious ideals or personal experiences, we hold these opinions and make decisions accordingly.

However, there are some phenomenon that perhaps warrant a little more inspection and maybe a little more flexibility. I am speaking, of course, about how we treat and what we do to our children.

There is no doubt that our society has seen a tremendous shift in the way we manage our children. The behaviors and actions of many youth today is, for lack of a more sophisticated word, troubling. Whether it is the way they dress, their vocabulary, or their overall sense of entitlement, American youth today are unique among their predecessors.

Now, that is certainly not to say that their predecessors had it all right. If you asked my mom, or my mom’s mom, or my mom’s mom’s mom (and so on), they would likely say the same thing about the youth of their day. For as long as youth have been around (yeah, they have been around since the beginning), they have pushed limits and boundaries as far as they can.

Back to the present.

The main “issue” many people discuss is the issue of entitlement. Many children and adolescents – and even adults into their mid- to late-20s – have a sense of entitlement that, were it electricity, would power the nation into the foreseeable future. That sense of entitlement leads to them holding the belief that they “deserve” everything that they want and that they “earn” rewards simply by showing up.

As I have mentioned on this blog before, participation trophies and the like are a perfect manifestation of this. As I have pointed out before, it is one thing to give all of the 5 year olds a trophy for their participation in a sport, but it is something else entirely to do so with an 11 year old. Eleven year olds understand (or should understand) winning and losing, a five year old does not, at least not to the point of any true meaning.

So, if entitlement is the issue, what do we do about it? Well, this is a situation where folks tend to fall on one side or the other. Some say, “Kids just need to be punished more, that will teach them what the real world is like!” That said, as an adult, I am rarely “punished” for my views or opinions of things. While this is not an endorsement for or a slam against Donald Trump, I think we can all agree that he is the epitome of the adult with an entitlement issue. How is he punished? In fact, his sense of entitlement has him leading the polls in many states.

So how does being harder by using more punishment deter kids from being entitled? The truth is, it doesn’t. However, that does not stop those folks from saying, “In my day_______.” You can fill in the blank, because we have all heard how wonderful things were 20 years ago, before there was all of this “ADHD business” or before there was all of this “coddling of kids business” or before there was all of this “kids living with their parents until they are 30 business.”

This perspective of being “tougher” on kids and our perceived need to “prepare them for real life” ticks me off (I wrote that before really thinking about it, so it is true, just not very eloquent). Let’s take another example, the one from the forum this week, Standardized Testing.

Again, we have people very firmly rooted on either side. There are those on one side who say that we should not be testing kids. That it places too much pressure on children when we test them with these massive assessments.

Unfortunately, those on this side often have a limited understanding of the importance of some of these tests. That is, we do need to know where kids’ abilities are. We need standardized methods of assessing kids to make sure that each child is gaining the skills he/she needs to progress academically. The skills we learned in third grade (i.e., multiplication facts) form a necessary foundation for all future academic skills. So we need to make sure that kids are learning the skills in a structured, systematic way.

On the other side, of course, we have those who say, “In my day_______.” Those with this view feel that the fact that America is low on the international rankings for academics is because we do not push kids hard enough. They feel that children are coddled. They feel that, to put it bluntly, we have made life too easy for kids. That we should test kids and that the kids should be happy about it.

Unfortunately, many on this side simply fail to see the issues with the system, as it currently is. They fail to appreciate that the tests we use today are based upon standards that are simply inappropriate. No matter how hard we push 5 month olds, they are not – as a whole – going to start walking. A few may, sure. But the majority will not. Similarly, no matter how hard we push them, ALL third graders will not read on grade level – no matter how far down we push the curriculum.

I started this blog post with the issue of dichotomies and how we become so firmly rooted in one view, that we tend to omit, ignore, or otherwise disregard opinions, facts, and perspectives from the other side of the coin.

Are children coddled more today? Probably, maybe, I don’t know. Are children more entitled today? Probably, maybe, I don’t know. But the key question is this: Will more punishment correct those issues? No! (yeah, that one deserves a more definitive answer)

Experiencing reality is different than punishment.

If we want to deal with the entitlement issue, parents need to allow their children to experience reality. Kids need to understand that sometimes, even if you try hard, you will fall short. Sometimes, no matter how much you want something, you will not get it. Sometimes, no matter how much you complain, you just will not get your way.

But this is not punishment. Actually, this is not really even being tough. It is simply being real.

However, this ends at the point when we place expectations on kids that are unreasonable and damaging. I have seen children, for example, who LOVED school. They loved to read and learn. Only to have that love squashed by the FSA and standardized testing. And the crazy part is, many of them passed the test! That’s right, they passed the FSA, but the pressure and expectations placed upon them as a result of the high stakes nature of the tests, resulted in an aversion to school. They were not being coddled, they were being – to put it in terms some have used – emotionally abused by the FSA.

Is there not a middle ground?

Is there not a position, somewhere in the middle, where we can honestly say that kids should experience reality, while at the same time ensure that that reality is developmentally appropriate?

Are we so caught up in the dichotomy that we cannot take a rational, realistic look at our situation, evaluate it, and make a decision that is based upon our and our children’s best interest?

I will end this much-longer-then-expected blog post with this:

To show true love for our children, we have to do what is best for them. What is best for them is to allow them to experience the highs and lows of life when it is still safe and they can learn how to manage the elation and the frustration. For them to experience the highs and lows, we have to expose them to reality, though a reality that is appropriate for their age and developmental level. Finally, exposing them to reality is NOT the same thing as being tough on them or punishing them.

The missing ingredient is NOT more punishment, it is simply reality.